Musings

I have been building birdhouses for 15 years now but have built very few these past few years as I've been having numbers of hand surgeries however, having had a surgery this spring as a result of too enthusiastic knitting I think I can return to birdhouses, but on a lesser scale. The secret, no doubt, is in learning to pace oneself.
Instead of trying to sell my houses all over the Kootenays and Northern Idaho I plan to only build and sell a limited number from our own gallery here at home, and that will also give me time to work more in fabric. I am planning on taking a couple classes this summer.
Also, The College of the Rockies Creston campus is again offering classes this summer in the arts. James will be teaching his Exploring Experimental Approaches to working with Acrylics.
This year the classes are of a 3 day duration, most on weekends.
I will teach a class on Building a Functional Art Birdhouse, showing people how to build a birdhouse that is playful and decorative, but also a safe healthy home for the birds.
The brochure is poorly done this year but I am glad to send people details myself.
The college can be reached at 1.866.740.2687 or 250.428.5332 or emailed at creston@cotr.bc.ca . The brochure lists my class as "Birdhouses" and gives no indication of the rustic, funky houses I build.

Here's Skeeter perched on Garth Huscroft's panther,

and trying to look innocent like she doesn't hear any baby birds!

And here is Bandy doing his Yin & Yang thing with the panther.

My how the times do fly .......

So, somewhere the last month and a half has flown by. When last I wrote Arts and Culture Week was just on and it seemed very soon after my most recent hand surgery. During that week there was an afternoon workshop and presentation by Don Maybe on Artist Trading Cards and this is a photo of the cards I made that afternoon. They are primarily fabric though there's a bit of detritus from the back lot made its way in too. The glue I used is an excellent heavy bodied glue called "Yes."

This picture was actually taken May 8 just after a lovely heavy shower. The forsythia, which I had threatened to hack down because it had bloomed so poorly for years rewarded my good pruning last year with a wonderful show of blooms this year.
We have a little chestnut tree my sister brought as a seedling and it has "lived" and grown imperceptibly for about 15 years but this year it is putting on new growth and has rewarded us with a blossom. Never give up!
For Arts and Culture Week the show at the Blue Awning was called Forty and on and was honoring this, the 40th year Creston has had a Community Arts Council. On that theme I displayed my knitted touques in groupings of 10, from infant, to child's, to youth, and to adult , with the highest grouping representing all ages and the future.

And then there were two.....

I do think it is spring this time. The chickadees are singing "Spring's coming" from the bushes. There's a large older magnolia tree ( the kind with white blossoms) on the way to the mall that is just coming into bloom and many bushes and trees are just waiting to pop their leaves.

Went driving north toward Sirdar. The banks are covered with dog toothed violets (avalanche lilies) We decided to drive out on the dike: lots of ducks, geese, coots, Black Necked Stilts, a couple swans, a blue heron, swallows, and a mamma black bear with her two last year's cubs!

The Black Necked Stilt is fairly rare here in the Creston Valley. They have wonderful "formal attire" and were quite close to shore so we could stop and see them well.
They have bright orange legs. They are quite showy little birds.
It was one of those days when I again think "Why don't I just put a pair of binoculars in the jeep?"
The binos were at home on the table because that is where the best bird watching starts.
Friday evening we had a pair of vultures soaring and swooping right close to us - so utterly wonderful!
Mamma bear and babies were across the channel from us far enough away that we weren't making her nervous, nor she us.
This week will be Arts and Culture Week across the province. Here in Creston we are again renting "The Blue Awning Gallery" across from the government agent's office on Canyon (main) Street. We have a show opening tonight in the west side and going on for the week with different activities in the east side of the building.
Next Saturday James will be helping Sandy Kunze raky behind Kingfisher Used Books and I will be attending an Artist Trading Card lecture and session at the Painted Turtle Gallery.
James and I are going to the opening of Arts and Culture Week tonight. James is showing the 2 pieces of metal sculpture shown at the top of the post. They are made to hang and are about 4 feet tall.
I have created an installation from some of the many, many toques I knit from Jan through March. The show's theme is Forty Forward, celebrating the 40 years of the existence of the Arts Council here in Creston and looking top the future.
My installation has large picture frames (4 of them) hung vertically and strung with wire like clothes lines and at the bottom I hung, using brightly coloured clothes pins, 10 infant hats for the very years, then, above that, 10 toddler hats, for a bit older, then 10 adolescent hats, and then 10 large adult hats.
In the top frame I have hung many hats of all sizes and colours representing the future.
I'll try to get a picture. James tried but it wasn't until we got home we realized his picture only showed the bottom 3 frames.

Promises of spring

Now that the Wynndel Ats Center is "virtually finished" James has had a chance to do some art himself. This is his metal sculpture from last weekend which he will show in the Art Show celebrating Arts and Culture Week at the "Blue Awning Gallery."
I need to evaluate who we've heard from and who we need to be contacting for this summer's ArtWalk.



Meanwhile, my frantic and joyful round-loom knitting has paid off. I have many, many touques to show as an installation at the Blue Awning and to sell this next fall and have had to have another hand surgery for a very badly triggering thumb. I am swanning about while James does the cooking and dishes. Stitches come out Friday -yea!!!!
Spring progresses slowly without me. The daffodils by the front door are nearly open and the little purple violets are blooming with abandon. These are "better behaved" than some and spreading slowly but my hope is for some more inclined to "take over".


I went up on the hill today to see what new wildflowers are about. These teeny, tiny blue flowers will soon carpet the ground but now they are still few and far between.

This is a slow spring. Down in the Lower Mainland, in the farming communities east and south of Vancouver the strawberry growers say their crops will be later than usual and sparser.
I've suggested to James we plant some of our own strawberries in the chicken pen where the deer can't get them. We had them in a raised bed where the deer ate the berries and James mulched them for one winter so well they composted, poor things.
Yesterday we bought our seed potatoes. At Straight from Earth Natural Food Store in town I see a sign saying they are selling the last of the local carrots and I need to buy some before they are all gone. I'm anxious to see things planted but I am a spectator at this time and it's still pretty cold to expect things to grow.

A whole day of sunshine! and a job well done.

Whee! Spring feels really here. I saw 2 towhees in the bushes, the honey bees are out again, the little tortoise shell kitty is seeking shade, and everything feels ready to pop.
James has been redoing his greenhouse, getting ready for tomatoes, and the project for the Wynndel Mudders is essentially finished!
James and Bruce Johnson renovated (rebuilt?) the old changing rooms from the former Wynndel Pool and made them into a really nice open 700 square foot clay studio.
Wednesday we threw a surprise party to honour James and Bruce for all their hard work.
Above, James and Dirk Kunze are philosophizing.
Sadly, we don't have any "before" pictures of the warren of toilet stalls and shower rooms and walls rotting off at the bottom.
James and Bruce tore out all that and with some help from several of the women pulling nails, cleaning, and painting they've made a real silk purse out of a sow's ear.

The outer walls and ceiling are all natural wood and the men post and beamed the room so it could be open concept.


In case one fears there's nothing left to do the outside of the building will need some help and there needs to be a bit of landscaping but for the time being both James and Bruce need to do their spring work at home. This being such a late spring they got a bit of a reprieve.
In November I posted pictures of James and Bruce working on the concrete which formed the floor for this large storage room (about 1/2 shown) which runs the width of the north wall.

Still springing

The little hat with the flower is in gray with periwinkle flower and a variegated periwinkle, gray green yarn knit with the gray.
The flower and leaves are crocheted.
I'm sort of resting my hands which, after just 3 months, are loudly complaining and growing lumps. Oh to have strong hands and wrists!
Anyway, I found a pattern for tendrils, as seen in the picture below, and I'm back to teaching myself real, two needle-type knitting and doing a bit of crochet which I know already.
I've been watching all the World's in figure skating but they are done tonight unless there is a gala. I may have pushed it as far as I can in that we do share the TV and figure skating is not James' thing.
I hope I've enough "grace" saved up to watch Midsomer Murders when it comes on!
This morning as we were dropping off the recycling we saw the first Kill Deer of the season. They are a real sign of spring. Robins may just overwinter somewhere else in the valley but the kill deer actually fly away and then return and it's a joy to see them in their jaunty little formal wear. It's amazing how well they blend with the side of the road when they have such a bright white and black collar.
The swans are also back.
As I drove down Devon Road the other day I saw a large white thing floating down to the flats, and my mind was going "Kite?", "Hang glider?", and then realized I was looking at a swan settling onto a big puddle with about 12 of his buddies. I drove down the little side road to get nearer but the binoculars would have really helped. This time of year they come in and rest at the channel on the south end of Kootenay Lake. A friend from Sirdar watched them flying over for more than 1/2 an hour. They don't stay long and then they are on their way north.
James and Bruce are nearly done the big remodel job for the Wynndel Mudders. After many, many hours of volunteer work I think they are glad to see the end nearing.
I'll try to get some more pictures. They took out walls and post and beamed the roof so it is basically one big room and an added on store room.
James decided he did not want to do the chicken-sitting this summer so we will have both pens to use as fenced, deer proof gardens.
I have just received a first draft of the Barraclough family history. My maternal grandmother was a Barraclough and my second cousin has been assembling this. It should be interesting.

Swans

Today, as I was driving home from town I saw a large white object floating across the flats and was going "plane?', "kite?" , "Big bird!" and when I saw it land I followed the road and there in a very large puddle were about a dozen swans!
This time of year they come in on Kootenay Lake at the south end, and this morning a friend who lives on Duck Lake, just south of Kootenay, said they were flying over for at least 1/2 an hour - hundreds of them!
This was a true March day we had every kind of weather including sleet and rain. This evening James went out on the porch and heard spring's first little frog.
After all the snow along the mountains and sleet here in the valley today, the sky is clear and starry tonight.
These little crocuses bloom between the walk and the porch. I took the pictures 2 days ago and it's been so gray ever since they've clasped their little petals tight shut.
I've decided I need to put a deer safe bulb garden just to the west of pond where the bedrock is very near the surface and the snow goes off earlier than everywhere else.
Winter is having quite the time letting go this year.
Meanwhile entries are coming in for ArtWalk. The Nelson & District Credit Union, Eastshore Branch is again supporting us with a small add in our brochure, which helps immensely. After March 30th comes the job of calling everyone we haven't heard from and getting their entries (or not.)
I've been "under the weather," "out of commission," etc. for the past couple weeks but am improving so that is good. Before I finally went to the doctor I was to point of going to sleep every time I sat down because I was so run down. One morning James brought me my coffee and fortunately I let it cool a bit before drinking it because I went to sleep drinking it and poured it down the sleeve of my bathrobe. After that I decided maybe this was going a little too far.